Once it was possible to define male and female roles
easily by the division of labor. Men worked outside the home and earned the
income to support their families, while women cooked the meals and took care of
the home and the children. These roles were firmly fixed for most people, and
there was not much opportunity for women to exchange their roles. But by the
middle of this century, men’s and women’s roles were becoming less firmly
fixed. In the 1950s, economic and social success was the goal
of the typical American. But in the 1960s a new force developed called the
counterculture. The people involved in this movement did not value the
middle-class American goals. The counterculture presented men and women with new
role choices. Taking more interest in childcare, men began to share
child-raising tasks with their wives. In fact, some young men and women moved to
communal homes or farms where the economic and childcare responsibilities were
shared equally by both sexes. In addition, many Americans did not value the
traditional male role of soldier. Some young men refused to be drafted as
soldiers to fight in the war in Vietnam. In terms of numbers,
the counterculture was not a very large group of people. But its influence
spread to many parts of American society. Working men of all classes began
to change their economic and social patterns. Industrial workers and
business executives alike cut down on "overtime" work so that they could spend
more leisure time with their families. Some doctors, lawyers, and teachers
turned away from high paying situations to practice their professions in poorer
neighborhoods. In the 1970s, the feminist movement, or women’s
liberation, produced additional economic and social changes. Women of all ages
and at all levels of society were entering the work force in greater numbers.
Most of them still took traditional women’s jobs as public school teaching,
nursing, and secretarial work. But some women began to enter traditionally
male occupations: police work, banking, dentistry, and construction
work. Women were asking for equal work, and equal opportunities for
promotion. Today the experts generally agree that important
changes are taking place in the roles of men and women. Naturally, there are
difficulties in adjusting to these transformations. In the passage the author proposes that the counter-culture ______.
A. destroyed the United States
B. transformed some American values
C. was not important in the United States
D. brought people more leisure time with their families